Skip Spence, Psychedelic Musician, Dies at 52

TimesMachine is an exclusive benefit for home delivery and digital subscribers.

Alexander (Skip) Spence, a pivotal figure in psychedelic San Francisco rock, died Friday at Dominican Hospital in Santa Cruz, Calif., where he had lived. The cause was advanced lung cancer, said his son Omar. He was 52 years old.

Mr. Spence was a founding member of both Jefferson Airplane and Moby Grape. As a songwriter, he twisted blues, country and pop into unpredictable shapes. He was primarily a guitarist, although he was drafted to play drums in the Airplane. But as early as the 1960's, Mr. Spence had been found to be a paranoid schizophrenic. After making his 1969 solo album, ''Oar'' (Columbia), he was institutionalized for many years.

Mr. Spence was born April 18, 1946, in Windsor, Ontario, and made his way to San Francisco by the mid-1960's. On his way to an audition for the band that became Quicksilver Messenger Service, he was spotted by Marty Balin of the nascent Jefferson Airplane, who decided by his looks that Mr. Spence was the drummer he wanted. Although he had never played the drums, after a week of practice he joined Jefferson Airplane for its debut album in 1966, ''Jefferson Airplane Takes Off.'' He wrote some of the band's early songs, including ''Blues from an Airplane'' and ''My Best Friend,'' a single from the Airplane's 1967 album, ''Surrealistic Pillow.''

By then, he had helped start a new band, Moby Grape. In September and October of 1966, Moby Grape spent eight hours a day rehearsing songs by its five songwriters; it stood out among San Francisco bands with its three-guitar front line and its capacity for elaborate pop vocal harmonies as well as virtuoso jamming. Mr. Spence wrote the band's most innovative songs, using unconventional structures and experimenting with studio effects. ''His mind was always churning over with stuff,'' Peter Lewis, another Moby Grape guitarist, told an interviewer. ''It was hard for him to sit and talk. He didn't deal in words, but in ideas. Yet he was an inspiration, always able to get people going on his trip.''

The band was quickly signed to Columbia Records, released its debut album in June 1967, and started a remarkable streak of bad luck and misguided decisions. The label released five songs simultaneously as singles, virtually guaranteeing that no one song became a hit. In the wee hours after the party to celebrate the release of the album, Mr. Spence and the band's two other guitarists, Jerry Miller and Peter Lewis, were arrested with three underage girls, though charges were later dropped. The band's first national tour earned it few new fans.

Moby Grape settled in Los Angeles to record a second album in late 1967, but spent more time partying than recording. Columbia had the band start new recording sessions in New York City, where Moby Grape was thrown out of numerous hotels and Mr. Spence took increasing amounts of hallucinogens.

One of his songs for ''Wow,'' Moby Grape's second album, was recorded with a 1930's-style dance orchestra and featured an appearance by Arthur Godfrey. After ''Wow'' was released, during recording sessions in July 1968, a delusional Mr. Spence went after band members with a fire ax. He was jailed at the Tombs and then committed to Bellevue Hospital.

He was discharged at the end of 1968, and went to Nashville. There, in four days in December, he made ''Oar,'' on which he played every instrument through multitracking. It included quasi-Appalachian ballads, eerie psychedelia and whimsical tunes with titles like ''Lawrence of Euphoria.'' Ignored at the time, it has since gained a cult following among musicians. It was Mr. Spence's last album.

His mental illness worsened, and he spent much of the 1970's and 1980's in and out of mental hospitals. In 1981 he became a ward of the state of California. He continued to play guitar and write songs, and he remained in contact with the members of Moby Grape. In 1990 he contributed a new song, ''All My Life I Love You,'' to a reunion album, with the band recording as the Legendary Grape because of a legal dispute over the Moby Grape trademark. ''Oar'' was reissued as a compact disk in 1993.

Mr. Spence was commissioned to write music for a revived ''Twilight Zone'' episode, but the score was not used. In recent years he had been living under home care. Mr. Spence sat in with the reunited Moby Grape in concerts in Northern California in 1993 and in 1996.

''More Oar,'' an album of new recordings of the songs on ''Oar'' by performers including Beck, Tom Waits, Michael Stipe and Robert Plant, is scheduled for release in July.